70 Directors for Venice 70

Biography
Born in Spain in 1960, screenwriter and director, she is one of the most interesting European filmmakers in contemporary cinema. She made her debut in 1988 as the screenwriter and director of the film Demasiado viejo para morir joven and won a nomination for the Goya as best director. She followed up with Cosas que nunca te dije (Things I never told you, 1996), a sentimental comedy set in the United States, A los que aman (Those Who Love, 1998) with Monica Bellucci and another anglophone film for Augustin and Pedro Almodòvar’s production company El Deseo, Mi vida sin mi (My Life Without Me, 2003), a moving portrait of a terminally-ill woman (played by Sarah Polley) who is determined to live her last days to the fullest, which was presented in competition at the Berlin Film Festival. The Almodòvar brothers also produced the film that marked her first participation in Venice in 2005, La vida secreta de las palabras (The Secret Life of Words), a drama about the conflicts that lacerated Europe set on an oil rig, and again starring Sarah Polley with Tim Robbins and Julie Christie: it was screened out of competition as the opening film for the Orizzonti section, of which Coixet was also a member of the Jury. In the years that followed, she participated in two collective films: Paris, je t’aime (2006), presented at the Cannes Film Festival, of which she directed the episode entitled Bastille, and Invisibles (2007), produced by Javier Bardem, and set in locations where Doctors Without Borders are engaged. In 2008 Elegy, inspired by the novel by Philip Roth and starring Ben Kingsley and Penélope Cruz, was presented at the Berlin Film Festival, while Map of the Sounds of Tokyo was in competition at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival. In 2013 she returned to the Berlinale with her latest feature-length film Ayer no termina nunca (Yesterday Never Ends).